Barnabas E-News January 2010

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Happy New Year to all our e-readers

We hope you enjoyed a break from routine over Christmas and that you are looking forward to 2010. The Barnabas Team is once again girding its loins for action - as we don our Messy Church aprons, slip on our well-worn training shoes and dust off those visual aids, engage our imaginations, unlock our ideas bank and recharge our Sat-Navs ready to support you wherever we can in the months ahead.

Stories, stories everywhere

January climaxes with National Storytelling week (www.sfs.org.uk) and telling stories - particularly Bible stories - is right up our Barnabas street! So, to join in with the fun, we would like to offer you a rather different set of new ideas this month: not of the written, but of the spoken variety!

The Team got together last month and recorded some of its favourite stories from our Barnabas books and elsewhere, which you can download and listen to! We hope you will enjoy hearing from us in this way and that it will inspire you to go on telling stories, which is by far the best way to ignite, nurture and deepen faith in the children (and adults!) we work with - and was recommended by Jesus himself of course (Matthew 13:34)!

Story time with Barnabas includes:

• Thingamajig from heaven (mp3) from The Lord's Prayer Unplugged by Lucy Moore, pages 54-55 - the story of God's provision of manna and quails in the desert (Exodus 16: 1-21) read by Lucy Moore
• Unstoppable great-granny Anna (mp3) from Footsteps to the Feast by Martyn Payne, pages 53-55 - the story of Jesus presented in the temple from Anna's perspective (Luke 2:22-38), read by Martyn Payne
• The lost sheep (mp3) from The Gospels Unplugged by Lucy Moore, pages 91-92 - Matthew 18: 10-14, read by Graham Nunn
• Adam and Eve (mp3) from The Lord's Prayer Unplugged by Lucy Moore, pages 44-45 - the story of disobedience in the garden of Eden (Genesis 3) read by the Barnabas Team
• Naughty Nora cleans up (mp3) from The Adventures of Naughty Nora by Stephen Cottrell, pages 10-16, on the theme of 'washing isn't just about getting rid of dirt', read by Lynda Ward
• Jonah and the big fish (mp3) from The Barnabas Book of Bible Stories by Su Box, pages 48-49 - the story of the book of Jonah, read by Jane Butcher
• The Little Black Book (mp3), previously published in Living Stories - Good Neighbours by Chris Hudson (National Society, 2000), reproduced with permission - the story of Zacchaeus (Luke 19:1-10), read by Chris Hudson

Fanning the flame

And talking of ways to ignite and nurture faith in our children, Chris Hudson, our Barnabas man in the north-east, has written an excellent feature article on just this. 'Fanning the flame of spirituality in children' explores that elusive 'spirituality' word and in particular unpacks what it means in children and how that relates to our work with them week by week.

He has also included three ideas you can try out that put theory into practice. This is well worth a read and perhaps you can share it with others in your team to help them get ready for your New Year's programme.

• Read this month's feature article

This year the Children's Ministry Conference at the end of January in Eastbourne is going to be a bit different! Kingsway Children's and Family Ministry has teamed up with Scripture Union and ourselves from BRF's Barnabas to offer an exciting range of seminars and events including:

The Children's Ministry and Family Ministry Conference in Eastbourne is at the end of January (22-24). If you are nearby, this is well worth a visit, and this year Barnabas and Scripture Union along with others are also offering seminars. Do say hello to the team, if you come along. Here's a reminder of what we will be doing:

On the Saturday: Lucy Moore on both Messy Church and all-age worship; Ken Wylie on using mime; Graham Nunn on using illusion

On the Saturday evening: Lucy Moore is masterminding the Saturday evening celebration for everyone under the title 'Entertaining Angels'

On the Sunday: Jane Butcher on 'Faith at Home' and Martyn Payne on 'Local Church, Local School'

• Find out more

Stories are so important

Picking up on the storytelling theme again, maybe we can draw your attention to some articles and ideas on our site that could help develop your skills in this important area for 2010. Check out:

• The Bible and Storytelling - a thought-provoking article by Lucy
• Storytelling - some reflections on the power of story for children and adults by Jane
• Reading stories aloud - some practical tips by Lucy
• Ways into a Bible Story - a template for opening up any Bible story by Martyn
• Exploring Bible stories with children - ten creative ways to get going by Martyn
• A wondering cube - a simple idea to get children asking questions about a Bible story by Alison Harris

Looking ahead and news

There are resources for Candlemas and Lent in the ideas section of the website under The Christian Year.

Check out the latest messy news and read Lucy's blogs on our Messy Church site.

Back to story

Have you ever wondered what it is about stories that make them so special? Why is it that stories are guaranteed to engage everyone's attention - young and old - whereas sermons too often send us to sleep? Why does a story stick in our memories far more effectively than a presentation with PowerPoint? How is it that stories keep on working in us and go far deeper than a memory verse?

Stories invite us on to a journey with the storyteller; they speak to us in a language of shared exploration; and most importantly they don't lecture us but give us space to think and discover meaning for ourselves. George MacDonald was a master storyteller and an acknowledged literary hero of C.S. Lewis. This is what he writes in an essay entitled 'The Fantastic Imagination' in 1893:

'The best thing you can do for your fellow... is not to give him things to think about but to wake things up that are in him; that is, to make him think things for himself.'

... and this is exactly what his stories and ours can do!

Happy storytelling everyone,

From the Barnabas Team
barnabas@brf.org.uk
www.barnabasinchurches.org.uk

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